Chapter 9 — The Woman I Buried

Dante placed the folder on the stage.

“Then we have time to negotiate.”

Vittorio laughed.

“You’re not in a position to negotiate.”

“I have something you want.”

“So do I.”

The pistol pressed harder against my shoulder.

I looked at Dante.

His eyes flicked toward the man backstage, then toward the nearest aisle.

He was measuring distance.

I knew enough now to recognize it.

“Dante,” I said.

His gaze returned to me.

“Let him read it.”

Vittorio looked pleased.

“Your wife understands the situation.”

“No,” I said. “I understand that you’ve been asking for these records since I woke up. You should decide whether they’re what you wanted before you shoot the person who brought them.”

He watched me for a moment.

Then he motioned to the man backstage.

“Pick it up.”

The man carried the folder over.

Vittorio opened it with one hand while keeping the gun close to me.

He scanned the first page.

Then the next.

His expression changed.

“This isn’t complete.”

Dante’s voice remained even.

“No.”

“You came here with half a bargain.”

“I came with what we could decode.”

Vittorio looked at me.

“Where’s the last set?”

“I don’t have it.”

He grabbed my hair near the scalp and pulled my head back.

I gasped.

Dante moved one step.

The man in the aisle raised his gun.

“Stay there,” Vittorio said.

Dante stopped.

“Let go of her.”

“Then give me something worth letting go for.”

I forced words through the pain.

“If I knew, I would have used it already.”

Vittorio looked down at me.

“You think that sounds convincing?”

“I think you know she kept it separate because she expected this.”

His fingers loosened.

Only slightly.

I held his gaze.

“You can kill me. It won’t make the missing pages appear.”

He released my hair.

My head fell forward.

I breathed through my mouth.

Dante stood so still that he seemed to have stopped breathing with me.

Vittorio took a step away.

“Matteo had the same stubbornness.”

I looked up.

“What did my father do?”

“He mistook marriage for a reason to betray his family.”

“He helped his wife.”

“He stole from his brother.”

“Records aren’t money.”

Vittorio’s mouth tightened.

Dante spoke before he could answer.

“You have the scholarship files. The transfers can be traced.”

“Some transfers.”

“Enough to open doors you’ve spent years keeping shut.”

Vittorio turned toward him.

“That’s why you’re here, isn’t it? You couldn’t finish it.”

Dante said nothing.

The man beside the backstage door received a call.

He listened, then approached Vittorio and spoke into his ear.

Vittorio smiled.

Not at Dante.

At me.

“There’s the rest of our evening.”

The backstage door opened.

A woman stepped through.

Her coat was dark. Her hair had gone almost entirely gray.

She held a pistol low beside her leg.

I saw her hand first.

The swollen knuckle on her little finger. The old burn mark near her thumb.

Then her face.

The room tilted.

“Elena?”

She stopped.

Her mouth trembled.

“Hello, my little star.”

I pulled against the ropes so hard the chair creaked.

“No.”

“Sofia.”

“No.”

I had put her photograph beside an urn.

I had thanked strangers for coming to her memorial.

I had spent nights wondering whether she had been afraid when she died, whether she had wanted me there and been too proud to ask.

Now she stood across the stage.

Alive.

“You let me bury you.”

Tears filled her eyes.

“I know.”

“You let me think I was alone.”

“I’m sorry.”

The words were too small.

I shook my head.

“Don’t say that like you missed a birthday.”

Her face changed as though I had struck her.

Good.

I wanted her to understand.

I wanted her to come closer.

I wanted both so badly I couldn’t speak.

Vittorio lifted his gun.

“Put yours down, Lucia.”

She looked at him.

“Take yours away from my daughter.”

“That isn’t how this works.”

Dante moved toward the lowest stage step.

One of the men shifted with him.

Lucia noticed.

“Dante,” she said quietly.

He stopped.

“You’ve grown.”

“This isn’t a reunion,” Vittorio snapped.

“No,” she said. “You’ve made certain of that.”

He pointed toward the floor.

“The gun.”

Lucia knelt slowly.

She placed it on the stage near her foot.

The man by the door moved to retrieve it.

Dante’s gaze followed him.

Vittorio held out his free hand.

“The final account reference.”

Lucia straightened.

“Let Sofia leave.”

“She stays until I know you haven’t brought another trick.”

“You already have enough tricks of your own.”

His face hardened.

I looked between them.

They knew each other too well.

This wasn’t the first time he had tried to frighten her.

It was only the first time I had seen her refuse to look away.

“Why did you leave?” I asked.

Lucia’s gaze came back to me.

“His men found our neighborhood.”

“Then we could have moved. We always moved.”

“He had learned Elena’s name. Moving would no longer have been enough.”

“So you died.”

“I made him believe I had.”

“You made me believe it.”

Her eyes closed briefly.

“Yes.”

“You could have told me.”

“I thought if he watched you grieving, he would believe it.”

I stared at her.

“You used that.”

Her voice broke.

“Yes.”

For a moment, no one moved.

Even Vittorio seemed content to let the answer wound me.

Lucia opened her eyes.

“I don’t expect you to forgive me here.”

“I don’t know if I can anywhere.”

“I know.”

It was the first answer she gave that didn’t ask me to understand.

Dante looked at her.

“You should have contacted me directly.”

“I did.”

His expression changed.

“Giuseppe’s?”

“Yes.”

I turned toward him.

“The restaurant?”

Lucia took a small step forward.

“I sent a message promising information about Vittorio. I knew you would go. I knew Sofia worked there.”

The beginning of my marriage shifted beneath me again.

“You sent him to my shift.”

“I needed someone strong enough to protect you.”

“And you didn’t think to ask whether I wanted that?”

“I was afraid you’d refuse.”

“Everyone keeps using that answer.”

Lucia looked down.

Vittorio tapped the pistol against the chair.

“Enough. The account.”

She lifted her head.

“Do you remember the first rule I taught you, Sofia?”

I stared at her.

Never attract the attention of powerful men.

That was the rule I had remembered most.

But not the first.

She touched the little finger of her left hand with her thumb.

A gesture I knew.

Quiet hands, she used to tell me when I was frightened.

Look first.

My breathing slowed.

A memory surfaced.

A kitchen table.

Smoke pressing beneath a door.

Her hands on my face.

When everyone watches the wolf, little star, watch the bird.

I looked up.

The theater ceiling was painted with clouds and a flock of blackbirds.

One bird faced the opposite direction.

Its eye caught the light.

Too sharply.

A small dark lens sat inside it.

I looked away before Vittorio could follow my gaze.

Lucia watched me.

Her shoulders lowered almost imperceptibly.

She had wanted me to see it.

The camera.

Someone could be watching.

Or it could be recording.

I didn’t know which.

I knew only that there was a reason she had come to this stage.

Vittorio stepped toward her.

“I said the account.”

“You killed Matteo for less,” she said.

“He gave me no choice.”

My fingers stopped working against the rope.

Dante’s gaze moved to me.

I kept looking at Vittorio.

“That’s what you tell yourself?”

He turned.

“What?”

“You said my father betrayed the family. But you were moving money through someone else’s foundation. He found out, and you had him killed.”

Vittorio’s eyes narrowed.

Lucia remained still.

I thought of the camera above us.

Of the records Ruth already held.

Of Dante’s phone beside the cassette player when I had persuaded him to wait.

I had no weapon.

I had no way out of the chair.

But Vittorio liked explaining why other people deserved what he had done to them.

So I gave him a reason to explain.

“Did Isabella give you no choice either?” I asked. “Or was she easier because everyone believed she was sick?”

Dante’s face tightened.

Vittorio turned fully toward me.

“You know nothing about Isabella.”

“Then tell me.”

Lucia’s eyes stayed on mine.

This time, I didn’t look at the bird.

I watched the wolf.